I am one of three Medic Coordinators at High Trails, which, in a nutshell, means I am in charge of student health and safety for the duration of a school’s stay here. At 23 years old, I am the youngest of the High Trails administrators, in addition to being one of the youngest people on staff as a whole. Here are my thoughts on being the youngest administrator at an outdoor science school:

• Working as a High Trails instructor last year was my first job out of college, and I don’t even have a science degree.
• I’m still convinced I’m the Medic because I wrote a good blog entry back in February.
• The people I supervise have Master’s Degrees, are EMTs, and have served in the Peace Corps. I haven’t achieved or done any of those things.
• I have taught a group of timid high school girls how to build a fire, and then stood back and watched proudly as they built their own one match fire the next day.
• I have listened to my students tell stories of deaths in the family, bullying at school, trouble at home, and helped them understand that there is support for them.
• I have led a discussion on the importance of sharing and implementing new ideas after a class bully laughed at a fellow student’s idea for solar powered cars.
• I have had some pretty powerful and amazing experiences, even if I can’t write them on a resume. I get to share those experiences with the people I work with, and they share their stories with me.
• I continually absorb information from the collective knowledge of our instructors and administration, which I use as a resource for my own personal growth and to help facilitate the growth of our staff.
• I am amazingly supported by everyone at High Trails, especially fellow administrators. I am not alone.
• I am the youngest administrator here…and it doesn’t really matter.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Sarah is absolutely correct. She may be young, but she displays professionalism, maturity, wisdom, leadership, common sense, and a wonderful sense of empathy for the people around her. She is one of those rare people who can do a lot at a young age. We’re proud to have her on our staff.

At High Trails Outdoor Science School, we literally force our instructors to write about elementary outdoor education, teaching outside, learning outside, our dirty classroom (the forest…gosh), environmental science, outdoor science, and all other tree hugging student and kid loving things that keep us engaged, passionate, driven, loving our job, digging our life, and spreading the word to anyone whose attention we can hold for long enough to actually make it through reading this entire sentence. Whew…. www.dirtyclassroom.com